Debts Signed in Red
by Rebecca Hb
Summary: Isana doesn't quite know what made her realize it, but Valiar Marcus is not who he says he is. Spoilers through "Captain's Fury".


Disclaimer: The Codex Alera is copyright Jim Butcher. This story is licensed under the Creative Commons as derivative, noncommercial fiction.

**Debts Signed in Red**

###

Isana didn't know what had tipped her off. Not the eyes, no. Not his eyes, not his voice, not his face, not even the way he walked. Fidelias was much too skilled for that.

Valiar Marcus could have been entirely who he said he was, except for the simple fact he wasn't. She had washed his feet seven years ago, and Rill had been in the water then. Her water fury knew him, no matter what face he wore.

He wasn't the man her Tavi trusted with his life, he wasn't the First Spear the First Aleran relied upon, he wasn't valiant _or_ faithful.

Except he was.

Valiar Marcus took his bath in the tents that still bore the name of Tavi's Tribune Logistica. Isana waited ten minutes, then hired a bath for herself. The water was steamingly hot, and it soaked into her muscles, easing aches she had no longer realized were even there. She closed her eyes, sinking further into the tub, and reached out to Rill.

Her water fury swirled in the waters of the bath with her, and the emotions of the other people in the bathing pavilion came sharper. Lust and pleasure coiled in Isana, and for a long moment, she hesitated. But, through Rill, she sensed the low, guarded set of emotions from Fidelias. She wrapped herself in them, using them as a shield and focus.

She sank deeper into the bath until the water covered her completely. Her eyes closed beneath its weight, and Rill softly covered her face so she could breathe.

"Fidelias," she said softly, and Rill swirled in the man's bath water. Shock ran through him as the water fury whispered his name and rose up, the most vibrant emotion Isana had ever felt from him.

All of his emotions were more vibrant than they had been those seven years ago, though still guarded so much more than other men's. A ghost of fear crawled across her senses, there and gone in less than a heartbeat. "Isana of Calderon."

Rill's fingers turned to ice, sharp as knives.

"Consider," Fidelias said softly, his gaze on Rill's hands, "What will happen if the captain loses his First Spear right now."

Rill leaned forward, one ice-bladed hand stroking Fidelias's chest. "I worry more," Isana said, "About what will happen when Lady Aquitane grows tired of letting you play the legionare and commands you to act."

Concern-worry-fear tangled inside of Fidelias, but his voice remained calm and quiet as he spoke. "Lady Aquitane has little interest in the First Aleran right now. Senator Arnos belongs to her."

There was something almost clouded in his words, a mixture of truth and lie she didn't trust. But she couldn't work out which part of his words were the lie - Lady Aquitane's interest in the First Aleran or his claim that Senator Arnos belonged to the High Lady?

Fidelias studied Rill for a moment. "Just as you belong to Invidia, Steadholder."

Isana hissed, and Fidelias's blood dribbled down into his bathwater.

"Careful. Lying to yourself will get people hurt." Fidelias pressed a hand over the cuts in his chest.

Isana could feel it as the cuts slowly scabbed over. Some part of her wanted to rip them open again, but most of her was disgusted she had cut him in the first place. He deserved to die for what he had done to Tavi and her family. He did not deserve it for his words.

"I am nothing like the Senator," she hissed.

"No," Fidelias agreed. "You are much more likable and competent. However, you've still traded your political clout to Invidia for the power she can give you. Just as he has."

She flinched in her bath, and the water in both tubs churned. He was right; she'd sold herself to Lady Aquitane. But at least she had done it for a noble reason, at least she had saved lives and was using the politics Lady Aquitane dragged her into to help protect even more lives. What did Fidelias do for the Aquitanes besides act as their hired cutter?

"And you?" Isana asked in a low voice. "What did she offer you? Money? What could be worth your-"

He raised a hand up to cover Rill's mouth. "Secrets have value, Steadholder."

Isana could have kept speaking through Rill. His hand didn't actually affect anything, beyond feeling strange and disconcerting to have someone else touching her fury. But she let him cut her off.

"Consider what a man who loves Alera might do to prevent someone like Kalarus taking the throne when Gaius finally dies," Fidelias said so softly she almost thought she imagined the words.

Rill roiled like the water fury was boiling. "How dare you? You lied to us, betrayed Amara, **murdered** people-"

She broke off, the image of Fade hanging off the battlements of Garrison, of Fidelias strangling her Tavi on the broken wall loud in her mind. He insulted her and lied to her- Except her watercrafting could read him better than it had so long ago, and she had known he lied there in Calderon Valley.

"I did nothing I did not do for Gaius." He reached out again and gently took hold of her water fury's wrist. "All told, I did much less damage than you did."

His blood fell into the bathwater again, and Rill's fingers came away red.

"It had to be done," Isana protested. It had all had to be done; the river had to be flooded to save Tavi, she had to accept Lady Aquitane's patronage to save the people of Calderon Valley from the Vord. Everything she'd done had been utterly necessary, no matter what she felt about it.

"Yes." Fidelias settled back in his tub and half-closed his eyes. He looked tired, the battered face of Valiar Marcus worn nearly to the bone. Weariness covered his other emotions, shielding them like a legionare's shield did a man in battle. "Life has a way of doing that."

It hurt in a way, the heavy exhaustion lurking around Fidelias. Isana instinctively drew back from it, knowing what it would do on top of her own tiredness and fear. That opened her again to the emotions of the other bathers, and she shuddered in her bath as heat coiled low in her belly. It wasn't real, it wasn't hers, and she almost wanted to hide again in Fidelias's muted, painful emotions rather than feel like this.

She could kill him, she realized, and no one would notice until morning. But then the competent, reliable First Spear of Tavi's Legion would be dead along with the betrayer and murderer who caused Second Calderon.

"I have just enough watercraft not to be bluffed at cards, Steadholder," Fidelias said, his emotions suddenly much more powerful to her senses, "but there aren't many worse places for a watercrafter to do what you're doing."

"It has to be done," Isana replied. Her water fury laid melting hands over the cuts on Fidelias's chest, and it was a simple matter to heal them. "It's not a choice I like, but the First Aleran needs their First Spear."

He let out a breath, and something like regret seeped out from behind the shield of exhaustion. "We all make choices we don't like, Isana of Calderon. At least yours have been mostly good."

**-End-**


End file.
